Stories From A Bunk Bed
by JuniperGentle
Summary: Team Wild Fang travelled hundreds of miles together before becoming the tight-knit, smooth-working team they are today. Whilst their days were often silent, it was the night-time conversations between their stars Nile and Kyouya that worked to bring to birth one of the greatest blading teams on earth.
1. The First Night

_My entry to the challenge "Character Mash Up" from the Masters of Metal forum. I was given the characters Nile and Kyouya, and told to do whatever I wanted with them, within reason. It certainly was a challenge, as I've never written Nile before, and it took me a while to get a grasp on his character. As I am exploring the unseen parts of the journey of Team Wild Fang, from the Savannah qualifier up to the battle with Team Chandora, he may act a little differently to his appearances in the anime, though._

_This is a multi-chapter fic, with approximately 10 chapters planned. As per the rules of the competition, at least two must be uploaded before the deadline of September 1st, 2012. I intend to have them all posted before then. Wish me luck._

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**Stories From A Bunk Bed**

**Chapter 1 – The First Night**

The first night was actually a day. They had been battling since the previous morning, twenty-four hours of fighting to keep hold of those precious bracelets around their wrists. It felt as if they had fought every blader in Africa twice at least, and both Nile and Kyouya were looking forwards to falling into bed for a few hours before they had to be back on the road again to get to the next of the African preliminaries.

They had arrived at the hotel in the late morning, straight after returning their bracelets to the president of Savannah and confirming their places as competitors in the World Championships. It wasn't exactly a stellar establishment, but it wasn't as if they chose it. Kyouya had used up almost all his money from Battle Bladers on the flight to Savannah, whilst Nile's part-time job as a waiter in a small inner-city restaurant in Egypt wasn't exactly well-paid. Savannah was too small a country to support them very much, either. Considering that they were also looking after Demure, who had come from the tribes with nothing of value except his phenomenal eyesight and his bey, it didn't come as much of a surprise that their funds were – to put it lightly – rather stretched.

Which was why they had to pick the cheapest room of the most run-down hotel, the one with the single bunk bed and the camp-bed on the floor. After all, getting three people into a room built for one meant more money per square foot, right?

"I get the top," Nile declared, dumping his bag on the higher of the bunks. "You can handle being on the bottom, can't you, Tategami?"

That was the thing. Kyouya had introduced himself as Kyouya, of course, but ever since he had assumed leadership of the little group of bladers, Nile had only ever called him Tategami. It was deeply frustrating, but Kyouya couldn't think of any way of fixing it. Especially not now, when his head was aching with exhaustion.

"I'd rather have the top one, _Nile."_

"Tough. I got here first, I claimed it first, so I get the top."

Demure ducked past Kyouya and collapsed onto the camp-bed. "Sort it out, you guys. I'm going to sleep right here."

And he did exactly that, only pausing to kick his boots off. Kyouya scowled. This was not working out anything like he had intended. For some reason, the intimidation tactics that had been so effective against the likes of Gingka were absolutely useless against Nile's stubbornness.

_Gingka_. That red-headed, pegasus-wielding _nuisance –_ and, of course, the reason why Kyouya was the sole Japanese member of the Savannah team, which certainly wasn't an easy position to be in.

Right now, for example, he looked to be in danger of losing the coveted top bunk.

"I'm taller than you," Kyouya pointed out. "If I'm on the bottom bunk, there's a good chance I'll sit up and crack my head, and then where will the team be? You'll never win without me."

Nile didn't look impressed. "We're fighting the team from Botswana tomorrow," he said. "I've fought them so many times that I could beat them on my own with my eyes shut. I'm on the top bunk."

"Fine," Kyouya growled. "Be like that. But if you let me sleep on the top today, I'll let you sleep on the bottom tomorrow."

"Nice try," Nile grinned, hopping up the ladder. "But not gonna happen. You can't outwit an African on his home ground."

Controlling his temper with difficulty, Kyouya dropped onto the lower bunk. It seemed that he had no choice. For today at least, Nile had got the better of him.

"You two sorted?" Demure asked in a very sleepy voice. "Oh good."

They certainly weren't _sorted,_ as Demure put it, though the problem of who was sleeping where seemed to be over. Kyouya rolled onto his back, glaring at the slats that his team-mate was lying on. This would be the last time that Nile ordered him about, he swore. He, Kyouya Tategami, was the captain of the team from Savannah, as the strongest of them and the most experienced. Just because Nile came from around here didn't automatically give him the right to boss everyone around!

"Goodnight, Tategami," Nile's voice floated down from above. "Get some sleep – you'll need it to beat the guys tomorrow."

The cheerfulness in his voice was deeply suspicious, but nevertheless Kyouya had little choice but to obey. After all, a tiny part of his mind pointed out, Nile was absolutely right on that one.


	2. The Reason for the Reasons

_Wow, that was a pretty amazing response, guys, so thank you!_ _Now I just hope I can write to the level of your expectations..._

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**Chapter 2 – The Reason for the Reasons**

Kyouya strode into the hotel room with the proud prowl of the king lion. So Nile had thought the team from Tanzania were going to be a problem, had he? They'd been the easiest prey Leone had taken down since he had ruled the Face Hunters. Not even a hint of a challenge, just like all the others they had fought so far.

And best of all? Nile was still haggling with the hotel owner over the price of the room, so Kyouya was able to get there first and dump his bag on the top bunk. Once again, it seemed, their funds would only stretch to a bunk room.

Kyouya sprang lightly up to the top bed, feeling the whole frame sway slightly as his weight hit it, and lay down with a satisfied grin on his face. There was no way that Nile was going to get the top bunk tonight. All in all, today was a good day.

"Kyouya?" It was Demure, peering around the doorway. "Oh, you're here already. Nile's on his way up – he's managed to get breakfast thrown in for free."

Kyouya grunted, not bothering to be any more articulate than that as he stretched. This was just the latest of a string of cost-cutting tricks Nile had been employing over the past four days as they had travelled across Africa, fighting through the various stages of the African tournament. For some reason, Nile seemed to be able to wangle much better deals out of the hotel staff than Kyouya was.

Just then, Nile himself walked in. "All done," he sighed, collapsing onto the bottom bunk and completely ignoring the fact that he'd lost the top bunk for the first time since the team had set out. "Man, I'm beat! Those guys put up a fight, didn't they?"

"You thought that was a fight?" Kyouya scoffed. "That was a walkover compared to..."

"Yes, I know, compared to all those other amazing battles you've had." Nile suddenly sounded extremely annoyed, almost bitter. "If Japan's team were so good compared to us, Tategami, why did you bother leaving?"

By now, Kyouya had learnt which tone Nile used for rhetorical questions, and so didn't bother to answer. Nile wouldn't believe the answer anyway. Coming from a place where he was the best blader by a long shot, he couldn't possibly understand the strength of the rivalry between Kyouya and Gingka.

So he just rolled over to face the wall.

There was a long period of silence in the room, broken only by Demure settling down onto his usual camp-bed on the floor. Finally, Nile said "So what made them so easy for you, Tategami?"

The bed shifted again as Kyouya shrugged. "That guy I faced? He was nothing compared to Leone's power."

This time, the silence was thoughtful. "So it's just power, then? Nothing about tactics?"

"What do you mean?"

"Didn't you realise? They'd obviously studied our battle patterns. They sent out their weakest blader first, knowing that he would lose to me, and then sent their strongest against you, hoping that he could get you because he was a Stamina type on his home ground. Then it would have been their second-strongest against Demure, hedging their bets and hoping for that second win in the third round. They'd thought about it a lot."

"What do you mean?"

Kyouya all but heard Nile rolling his eyes. "I mean that we're coming up against tougher and tougher teams, Tategami. We can't just rely on old tactics and straight-out power all the time. Our future opponents will be studying every move, finding ways to counter us. We've got to start working as a team, a _proper_ team, instead of just three individuals."

"Blading is individual," Kyouya snapped back. "Once you're in the dish, it's just you, no-one else. There's no point in being in a team if they can't actually do anything. You're on your own."

There was a sharp movement to the bed as Nile sat up, swung his legs over the side of the mattress and scrambled up the ladder to glare at Kyouya. "Then why bother joining a team at all, Tategami? If it's all solo work, why not enter on your own?"

"I can't." Kyouya spat. "You know the rules. Three regular members to every team. I'm good, but even I can't be three people at once."

Nile's glare intensified. "Tell me, Tategami, why did you want to join this team? I do pay attention to the news – you'd already qualified for the Japanese team, but you gave up that place. Why?"

Kyouya took in a deep breath through his nose, trying to prevent his temper from getting the better of him. "I have my own reasons. I don't see why they have anything to do with you."

"Liar."

The shock of the word made Kyouya sit bolt upright. "_What did you call me?"_

"You're lying," Nile informed him acidly. "I know why you want this team. It was the only one you _could_ join, because you couldn't stand to be on the same team as your greatest rival. I do watch the news, you know, Tategami. So I know that your reasons for being here _do_ concern me. In fact, they concern me very much indeed."

"So?" Kyouya really wasn't certain what Nile was getting at. "If you know the reasons, why bother asking me about them?"

"Because I wanted to see if you were going to admit that you didn't actually care about getting the title, but that you only came here so that you could fight Gingka Hagane again, this time in front of lots of people so that they could all see the result. So that it would be public knowledge, which one of you was best. But if you're just going to use this team as a vehicle to get revenge on someone who beat you a year ago, then you can get out. Now." His voice was ice-cold. Kyouya had never heard anything else like it, not even in the dragon-infused voice of Ryuga. "We have no need for people who aren't going to take part as one of the team. We're heading for the Championship title, Tategami, not some stupid revenge match."

"Who is this _we?_" Kyouya asked, merely for the sake of saying something and giving himself a chance to think.

"Me and Demure," Nile responded at once. "The _African_ members of the _African_ team."

This was unexpected, but not entirely so. Kyouya had been aware from the beginning of his unusual position on the team, and had taken steps to ensure that he was not pushed aside simply because he didn't come from the same place as the other two. Perhaps he had been a little too forceful with them, though.

"What makes you think that I don't want the World title too?" he asked, folding his arms across his chest.

"Because if you wanted the World title, you'd have stuck with the Japanese team instead of quitting on them," Nile replied. "And there's no point you trying to be leader of our team if you want something different to the rest of the team."

Ah, yes. The leadership issue. Kyouya had been wondering if this would come up.

"_A good beyblader is more than just a winning beyblader. He's got to have real leadership skills in order to rise above the rest of the pack."_ Someone had told him that, many years ago when he had just started learning how to blade. It was the philosophy he had stuck to ever since, first with the Face-Hunters, and then with Gingka's little group when it was necessary for someone to step up and take command.

Kyouya knew he was a winning blader. Now he wanted to be a good blader; a _great_ blader. He had the most experience leading a blading team of the three members of Wild Fang, so it made sense for him to lead, right?

But it seemed that Nile didn't think so.

"Nile, I want that title as much as you do," Kyouya growled. "That's why I _have_ to beat Gingka. He's been called the best in Japan, just because he won Battle Bladers, which wasn't even meant to be a fair competition anyway. So I have to win this World Championship to _prove_ that I'm better than he is. Beating him along the way is a bonus – but one that I will take very, very seriously, as should you."

It seemed that Nile was at least partially satisfied with this answer, because he hopped off the ladder and back to his own bed. "Just make sure you don't forget that, Tategami," floated up from underneath Kyouya's mattress. "World first, Hagane second."

But there was no way it could be that way round, Kyouya thought as he rolled himself up in his blankets. Because in his world, Gingka would always be standing between him and the title of _best __in the world_.


	3. Matters of Money

**Chapter 3 – Matters of Money**

This hotel was worse than most. The bunk bed creaked horribly whenever either of them made the slightest movement, and Nile wasn't sure if the spindly, wood-worm-filled legs would even hold the combined weight of him and Tategami.

He had won the top bunk as usual, and was staring at the flaking, moulding plaster on the ceiling. It had been a much longer day than usual, and he was determined to get some more beyblade practice in the following morning, if only he could get up early enough. Which, naturally, meant he needed to get to sleep as quickly as possible so that he was rested enough for another day of travel as well as practice. Demure was already asleep, apparently thinking along the same lines as Nile, but Nile could hear (and feel) Tategami tossing and turning in the lower bed.

Suddenly, Tategami said, "Nile?"

"Hmm?" Nile didn't take his eyes off the ceiling. It couldn't be that interesting.

"How much money have we got left?"

There was a long silence as Nile let the words sink in. So Tategami had finally noticed. He let out a soft sigh and admitted, "Lodging for tomorrow, and food for tomorrow and the day after. Then that's it."

Nile could almost hear the swear-words that Tategami was thinking. "Is there any way to get more?"

The bed-boards creaked as he shrugged. "Quickly? Illegal underground beybattles, or hawking stuff on the streets."

"We've got nothing to sell." Tategami's voice wasn't at all accusatory, just stating facts.

"True. Beybattles it will have to be."

A short, uncomfortable pause. Then Tategami said tightly, "I thought you just said that was illegal."

"It is." If he was entirely honest, this didn't bother Nile in the slightest – after all, he had tactics, practice _and_ power on his side. He could run rings around anyone who challenged him, and if it was a little bit on the wrong side of the law, it was better than stealing. "And round here it's run by blading gangs. We can't win too many or they'll accuse us of cheating and refuse to pay up, or even take our blades."

Tategami's snarl rumbled through the air. "I _refuse_ to lose on purpose!"

There was that stupid, aggressive pride again! Would Tategami never understand that he was in a team now? The argument a few nights ago should have told him what Nile thought of that. Nile leaned over the edge of his rickety bed and scowled at his team-mate. "You don't have a choice! It's that or we all starve!"

"I'd rather starve," Tategami shot back, rolling over to face the wall. "You know your problem, Nile? You're just not tough enough."

Every muscle in Nile's body tensed in fury. How _dare_ this Japanese upstart come round here claiming that he was tougher than Nile, who had lived in this area and this climate all his life? "And you know your problem, Tategami? You're too damn proud."

"Tell me something I don't know." Tategami snapped, turning back very suddenly and making the whole bed wobble.

"Something you don't know? How about how to deal with the sandstorm that's due to cover the road we're walking the day after tomorrow to get to our next match? You'll need both me and Demure to get through it alive."

Tategami made no response. Nile flopped back onto his bunk with a muffled growl, wondering how on earth the president of Savannah had thought that putting a group of random bladers who had never bladed together in one team was a good idea. All the other teams had been fighting together for a few months – or knew each other at least – before they decided to join the World Championships. But all that Wild Fang was capable of doing, it seemed, was fighting each other, and getting nowhere.

"How can you even think of losing deliberately?" Tategami asked, out of the blue. "What kind of blader allows someone to beat them when they could win?"

"Sometimes winning everything isn't a victory," Nile said at last. "There's strategy and tactics, and they make up half a battle. If winning two out of three battles means that I get to keep my winnings and my blade, even though I could have won the third as well, then I'll go for the loss rather than win all three and lose everything except my pride."

That was the way he had always fought – to get the maximum possible gain from the smallest expenditure. In the heat of the African sands, every wasted movement was a waste of water, a waste of energy. Even his Special Move took some time to power-up, so that he didn't use it immediately and waste its full effect and a lot of his own strength. Avoiding useless battles meant more power for the battles that mattered. And if that meant that his battle record outside of competitions wasn't the long run of wins that he suspected Tategami wanted it to be, then that was fine, because that was Tategami, not him.

"How strange," Tategami said, and his voice was confused. "Does your constellation not care that you're allowing it to be defeated? Leone would tear me to shreds if he thought I wasn't giving it my all; it's just not the way we fight."

"You'd rather have an all-or-nothing chance, then?" Despite himself, Nile was becoming interested. "Even though you could lose everything you have?"

"Hah! As if anyone could take my Leone away from me."

"I've had Horuseus taken before." If he thought that telling Tategami that would work as a warning, Nile was hopelessly wrong. Tategami just laughed.

"I'd never be so weak. No-one would _dare _take Leone from me like that."

"But what if they did?"

"They wouldn't. And anyway, in life it's defeat or be defeated; it's the same in a beybattle. Win or lose – that's the only important thing. And I _will_ win."

"Then you and I will just have to disagree," Nile snarled. "Sometimes, in a team battle, it's best for someone to lose. Remember the team from Tanzania? They knew that their second-strongest blader couldn't defeat either me or you, but that their strongest might be able if he got his tactics right. So they surrendered one match in the hopes that their second-strongest blader would be able to defeat Demure."

"Except that they didn't," Tategami argued. "Because even their strongest wasn't enough to take me down. Like I said, I will _always_ fight to win, no matter what the cost."

"But if you had lost? Sometimes losing the battle means you win the war." Nile was speaking through gritted teeth as he tried to remain calm. "You might want to remember that one day."

"Maybe," Tategami shot back. "But if you win enough battles, the war is over a lot quicker."

Silence descended over the room, and Nile gripped Horuseus tight in his hand. He didn't care what Tategami said; he was never going to lose his blade again, ever, even if it meant having to surrender some matches. Nile was a tactician to the end. Without the enormous, raw power that Tategami's blade had, and without the incredible accuracy of Demure's, all he had was his Special Move, and tactics he had learned through the long years; tactics which meant that he could face any opponent in the dish and have a very good chance of beating them, no matter how strong they were or what kind of bey they had. It was his secret weapon.

"Alright, Nile, I'll compromise with you," Tategami said suddenly. "We'll battle the street gangs tomorrow, and if it looks like they're going to refuse to pay out, I'll let you call the shots. I can beat them all at once if I have to, to get the money, or if we really have to, I'll leave. But I _won't_ lose a battle on purpose, not even just by retreating. It's not my way."

Nile could tell from his tone that this was the best offer he was going to get, albeit the grumpiest. "Fine," he snapped. "As long as you remember that _I'm_ the one who's going to say what happens, and not decide on your own route at the last second."

There was a long moment of silence, and he thought that Tategami had fallen asleep. But then his voice came floating up from below.

"Just because I'll take your advice doesn't mean I'm letting you boss me around. I'm still the most experienced, and you know it. I'll make my own decisions, and no-one else will ever make them for me. That's how I got here, and don't you forget it."

"You do that, Tategami," Nile responded, rolling over to face the wall and feeling Horuseus sparkling at the edge of his mind like a half-forgotten dream. "You win the battles, and I'll win the war."


	4. The Storm Begins

_This chapter and the following one will be the only ones not be set at night._

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**Chapter 4 – The Storm Begins**

It was mid-afternoon. Demure and Nile had been casting nervous glances over their shoulders every minute or so for the past three hours, and it was beginning to get on Kyouya's nerves.

"If you're so frightened about that supposed sandstorm, then why didn't you stay back in the city?" he snarled. For once, it was Demure who rounded on him.

"Because I want to get to the next city so that we can carry on heading for the World Championship!" he snapped, nerves fraying with the terror the wind was carrying towards them with every second, darkening the sky. "If we miss this battle, we'll be disqualified, and it'll take two days to walk there!"

Kyouya didn't bother answering this, but even if he'd tried to he would have been interrupted. "Demure," said Nile sharply, voice carrying a strange edge. "Look behind."

The tribes-boy's eyes grew wide with fear as he saw what Nile was pointing at. "We need shelter, _now._ It'll be on top of us in fifteen minutes at most."

"This way." Nile immediately took charge, heading off the road towards an outcrop of rock, with a stand of about seven trees about half a mile from it. "There's a cave in these rocks. If we cover the entrance, we'll be safe enough."

He was right. Hidden within the rocky walls of the outcrop was a small cave, barely visible unless you knew where it was. Even Demure was surprised when Nile made a sudden left-turn and vanished into the dark mouth.

"This is perfect," he breathed, ducking inside. "A couple of blankets over the entrance and this'll be the best storm-shelter we could hope for. What do you think, Kyouya?"

Silence.

"Kyouya?" Demure turned round, only to realise that the third member of the team had not entered behind him. In fact, he was still walking, heading towards the trees a little way off, clearly meaning to shelter there instead.

"Tategami!" Nile roared, coming to the entrance of the cave. "Where do you think you're going? We're stopping _here!"_

Kyouya ignored him, stomping on down the dirt road towards the tiny stand of trees.

"You can't outrun sandstorms, Kyouya!" Demure called, glancing between the roiling clouds of sand on the horizon and the slowly retreating figure of Kyouya. "You're not from around here; you wouldn't understand our country! It's too dangerous – come back!"

"Tategami!"

"It's useless, Nile," Demure groaned. "He's not going to come back."

Nile flopped down onto a rock inside the cave. "Idiot. He'll be killed, and then where will we be? Only a foreigner would think he knew better than us in a sandstorm."

"Let's just get the covers up," Demure suggested. "Maybe he'll get lucky. But we really do need to get a move on or the sandstorm will get us too."

The next few minutes were a flurry of work as Nile and Demure worked overtime to cover the entrance of the cave and seal it from sand as best they could whilst still leaving tiny air-holes for breathing. All of their equipment was stacked at the back of the cave, and there was even a small alcove facing away from the entrance that three people could have used to shelter from whatever fragments of the storm blew in.

But there would only be two people in it now.

"Demure, pass me that rope?"

"Swap you the rope for the hammer."

"Done... yep, this side's up."

"So's this one," Demure panted. "There, that should hold. Just let me check once more before we seal it up..."

He stuck his head out of the side of the blankets that covered the doorway and looked around. The tiny figure of Kyouya was a surprising distance away, still walking at the same pace. But from the other direction, the sandstorm was almost upon them, little feelers of wind already throwing eddies of sand into the air.

"Quick!"

The blanket was sealed as tight as possible, and Nile and Demure huddled in the alcove together as a strange howl began to build up outside. It sounded like some great, wounded animal, heaving in its death throes.

"That _idiot_," Nile burst out suddenly. "Who does he think he is? I don't care if he's King of the Beasts, even Horus, Prince of the Gods, is going to hide from a sandstorm like this."

Demure ignored him, listening to the howl of wind building up outside. Tiny trickles of sand were already falling into the cave, and he made sure once again that his precious bey was well wrapped up in his spare clothes in his bag to protect it. It would take hours to get every grain of sand out so that the core wasn't damaged when he launched it. That was, _if_ he launched it. So far, of course, Nile and Kyouya had won their matches easily, so he hadn't been needed.

If he was honest, Demure was beginning to wonder what he was doing in the team. The only thing he'd done to help them so far had been to spot Marcus and his fellow cheats running for the hills – and Kyouya had just _given_ him the band, rather than making him fight for it. Was he really good enough to be on this team, heading for the top of the world?

In fact, was the team itself good enough? It had been clear ever since they had formed that Kyouya considered himself the leader of the team, even though he wasn't even African. Surely it would have made more sense for the almost-as-powerful (and African) Nile to be captain of the Savannah team? Okay, yeah, Nile wasn't actually from Savannah, but they were attempting to become the representative team of the whole of Africa, so it would be fine.

This apparent determination to fight for the leadership of the team was beginning to show the cracks in what little remained of their team-work. If they couldn't get it together, and soon, Demure knew that they would meet a team who could beat them purely because the two powerhouses of Team Wild Fang couldn't agree on anything.

Nile was still muttering something about _"That fool Tategami,"_ and "_Should have guessed he'd think he knew best", _but Demure decided to carry on ignoring him. The sandstorm outside had peaked at a steady roar, and though there was still a tiny bit of sand was coming into the shelter, it wasn't enough to worry about. He might as well settle down and try to get some sleep whilst he could.


	5. Finding Fear, Finding Hope

**Chapter 5 – Finding Fear, Finding Hope**

Sleep proved impossible. The air inside the cave grew thicker and hotter as the hours trickled past like the sand falling into the shelter, and both of its occupants were irritable and headachy in the darkness.

"Nile?" Demure coughed and tried to draw in a deeper breath. "Nile? D'you think the storm's dying down?"

"I can't hear anything," Nile agreed slowly, his voice drifting lethargically on the dark air. "But I'm not gonna be the one to stick my head out. Let Tategami do it."

"Kyouya's not here," Demure reminded him.

"Oh yeah... guess... I'd best do it, then."

Demure felt his team-mate push past him towards the blanket-covered door. The next thing he felt was a harsh gust of cold air as Nile peeled the blanket away from the rock edge a little. There was a lot of coughing, and then Nile's voice said "Yeah, it's stopped. The air's still full of sand, though. Keep everything in the bags for now."

Demure joined him at the door, glad for the fresh air after so long spent in the mugginess of the cave. "Nile, we've got to find Kyouya. I know you don't want to, but..."

"Who said I don't want to find him?" Nile asked quickly. "If we don't find him, I can't yell at him for being so stupid and walking out into a sandstorm." But there was something else in his voice, something suspiciously like worry. He stuck his head out of the cave as Demure quickly pulled the blankets down. "Tategaaaami?" He called, making his voice echo around the rocks. "Helloooo? You there?"

There was no answer.

"Kyouya?" Demure was the next to call for their team-mate. "Where are you?" Once again there was silence. "Maybe he's right down by the trees. He'd got quite close to them when we shut up the cave."

"Let's go." Nile's response was immediate.

Scrambling over the sand-buried rocks was more dangerous and time-consuming than they had anticipated, but at least they could still make out the main road from where they were – the sandstorm had blown right over it, leaving it scoured clean.

"Tategami!" Nile yelled into the murky air as they drew to a halt under the trees. "Answer me!"

But again there was no reply.

"Maybe he's buried somewhere," Nile snapped. "Quick, dig around near the trees and see if you can find any clues. If we're quick, we might have a chance of finding him alive."

Demure started towards the central stand of trees whilst Nile began to attack the sand masking the lower trunks of the outer trees. The sharp-eyed tribesman was astonished at the speed with which Nile was burrowing through the sand. Maybe he cared more about Kyouya than he had been showing.

The pair of them carried on working for nearly ten minutes before Demure started to flag in the thick air. Nile, however, kept going, pushing aside great mounds of brown sand and getting right down to the roots of the trees before changing where he was digging. It was many long minutes before he suddenly froze, and reached down into the hole he'd just dug, pulling out the familiar bag that Kyouya had carried over his shoulder.

"There's nothing else down there," he said when Demure came over to see. "That was the last tree he could have been sheltering behind. And this is just full of sand." To prove his point, he tipped it upside down, and a torrent of dirt fell out of it, along with a couple of sand-filled lumps that might have once been Kyouya's spare clothes. Nile looked up at Demure, his eyes full of some unspeakable emotion. "Demure... I-I think we've lost him."

.

The two sat in the sand, side by side, as the air settled thickly around them, wondering just what they could do now.

"I didn't want him to die," Nile kept on saying. "He was a pain, and he was so cocky all the time, acting as if there was no way we could win without him... but now he's gone, I'm not so sure he was wrong."

"We don't have a sub-member," Demure reminded him. "If... if he's really gone, we can't reach the Championships anyway, because there aren't enough of us in the team to qualify to be the African team."

"What a stupid idea it was to only have the three bracelets," Nile sighed, leaning back against the tree. "We should have thought about having a fourth member in case one of us got injured in a match. But there's nothing we can do about it now. We'll just have to... to try and explain that Tategami's not going to be fighting for us any more." He tilted his head back to stare up at the murky leaves above his head. "We'll have to go in a minute, if we want to get to the city before sundown. There's not much daylight left, and we'll have to walk through the night anyway."

Demure hesitated, however. "I.. I'd like to... I mean, can I... can we bury his blade? So it's with him in the sand. That's what we do in my village when someone's taken by the desert – we bury his or her most precious possession to show that they've been taken down into the sands."

For a long moment, Nile looked hesitant. Then, finally, he nodded. "It'd mean no-one else could take his bey, too. He deserves that at least."

Scrambling to his feet, Demure went back over to where Nile had emptied Kyouya's bag. But as he scanned the spilled contents, he realised that there was something very important missing.

"Nile! Leone's not here – and neither is the launcher!"

"That's because Leone's with me."

The impossible voice came from their left, falling flat on the dead, heavy air, and they both wheeled around in shock. "Kyouya!"

"You're... alive." Nile's incredulity was visible on his face. "H-how?"

Kyouya shrugged lazily. His hair was wet, matted with sand and dirt, and his face was streaked with mud, but he was most definitely alive. "I found a cave in just the right place."

"That's impossible," Nile breathed, eyes wide. "We were in the only cave for miles around... and I should know, I grew up near here."

Kyouya's smile was tired but triumphant as he picked up his bag and shook the remaining sand out of it. "You might have grown up near here, but I know how to find things that are hidden. Besides, you've never faced the wild until you've faced Wolf Canyon."

"Wolf Canyon?" Demure began to ask, but Nile overruled him.

"Where?"

Kyouya pointed towards the centre of the stand of trees, shaking out a pair of trousers that were saturated with sand with the other hand. "You said that there was a pool here, with a river running off that way," he said. "But the water must come from somewhere."

"Yes, there's an underground spring..."

"So that's where I went," Kyouya said. "There was enough air down in the caverns to survive, and the sand can't get down there."

Demure frowned. "If the sand can't get down there, how did you?"

Kyouya's grin was mischievous. "Watch."

Stuffing everything back into his battered bag, he led them down to the pool, which was gradually clearing of sand and mud. With Kyouya pointing the way, they easily found where the underground spring fed into the pool from the bank under their feet. The entrance was surprisingly large, carved out of the rock over many hundreds of years, and it was mostly covered with plant growth.

"It's really big inside," Kyouya said, pulling the plants away from the entrance. "Take a look."

Nile and Demure dropped down into the spring and ducked under the curtain of plants. "Oh, wow," Demure breathed, eyes wide in wonder as he gazed around.

Kyouya had been right. The spring had obviously been much bigger in years gone by, because it had carved out a sizeable cave through the rock buried under the sand. Now it filtered happily through a little channel down the middle of the cave, leaving a wide shelf on one side that was as smooth as glass. Odd rock formations hung from the ceiling, sparkling with water drops until the whole place looked like it was filled with jewels. Pleasantly cool from the river, the air was also fresh due to how close it was to the outside – though the outside air wasn't exactly clear right at that moment.

Kyouya stepped onto the shelf, dropping his bag. "It's easily big enough for us to sleep here tonight." he said. "The sun's nearly gone down, and otherwise we'll be sleeping in the open."

"You really found this just before the storm hit?" Nile asked, not moving from his spot, still trying to take everything in. "And you just stayed down here until the storm was over?"

"Of course. The plants shielded the entrance, so no sand got through."

Demure was trying to make sense of everything he had heard and seen in the past few minutes. "But... your bag was under the tree! We thought you were buried under there!"

Kyouya grimaced. "Yeah... I guess you were right. Those sandstorms come on a lot faster than you expect. I dumped it down there when I went into the cave because I wanted to make sure I could get in and out of the entrance safely. But I didn't have time to go back for it before the storm was on top of me."

Nile shook his head. "You really are an idiot, Kyouya."

A moment of shocked silence followed his words, and Kyouya's eyes flashed warmly in the dimness. Demure's jaw had dropped. "You just called him Kyouya!" he spluttered.

Nile had the decency to look a little bit embarrassed. "Tategami's too long," he muttered, looking at the floor. "And anyway, Demure, you call him Kyouya."

"True... but why now? We've been travelling together for over a week now; you'd have thought that you could have changed your mind before now."

Nile shrugged. "Tategami's a pain in the backside, far too stubborn for his own good, and thinks way too highly of himself. Kyouya's still far too stubborn, but it's a good sort of stubborn. It's the sort of stubborn that's gonna win us the World Championship title. I can probably get along with Kyouya, which is more than I can say for that idiot Tategami." Kyouya just burst out laughing.

Demure was looking around the dim interior, and suddenly he laughed. "Look, Kyouya!" he said, pointing. "You even managed to find somewhere with bunk beds!"

He was right. Above the wide shelf was another, narrower shelf that must have been made of harder rock than the surroundings. It did look remarkably like a bunk bed.

"Oh good!" Nile cheered. "I get the top, then!"

Kyouya didn't even bother arguing. "So, are you happy that I can look after myself in your country, now?"

Nile punched him lightly on the arm. "Alright, Kyouya. You're obviously tougher than even I thought - either that, or you're luckier. Either way, we want you on the team."

Kyouya grinned, and returned the punch. Team Wild Fang was back together again.


	6. Horuseus

**Chapter 6 – Horuseus**

Sleeping on a hard rock shelf was very different to lying on a mattress. Kyouya had forgotten what it was like to sleep rough. Lying on his side was impossibly uncomfortable, so he'd settled for putting his coat under his shoulders and rolling onto his back, using his bag as a pillow. If it had not been such a tiring day, there was no way that he would ever have managed to fall asleep. As it was, the stress of finding the cave with only seconds to spare, then keeping Leone spinning throughout the sandstorm to give him a little bit of light and companionship through the long hours had taken its toll.

Demure, it seemed, was used to this sort of sleeping arrangement, and was already fast asleep, but Kyouya could hear Nile shifting on the slender shelf of rock over his head.

"Hey, Nile? You alright up there?" he called softly. "Not too high up there for you, is it?"

"Oh shut up, Kyouya," Nile sighed. "I just haven't slept outside since... since the night I found Horuseus, actually."

"You _found_ your constellation?" This caught Kyouya's attention. "Really?"

"You mean you didn't?" Kyouya saw Nile's eyes glinting at him as the other boy leant over the edge of the rock shelf. "How'd you get Leone, then?"

That was a difficult question. "I'm not sure," Kyouya answered slowly. "It was... a long time ago."

"How long have you had him?"

Again, Kyouya was slow to answer. "Maybe...eleven years? Maybe more. I really can't remember."

This wasn't quite true, though. Kyouya could remember the first time that Leone had appeared for him in a battle very clearly indeed. But he knew that he'd had the lion long before that battle, a companion rather than a defender. Telling Nile about that, though, would mean delving into some memories that he would much rather leave buried.

"Eleven years!" Nile exclaimed. "I've only had Horuseus about three."

"Tell me how you got him," Kyouya ordered, then realised what he was doing. "I mean, would you?"

There was the sound of cloth over rock as Nile shifted back to his original position. "Like I said, it was about three years ago. I was out with my brothers, playing in the back garden like we always did, when I saw this falcon high up in the sky. Where I live, falcons are really, really rare, so I pointed it out to my brothers. But they couldn't see it, even when I pointed right at it. Eventually they told me to stop wasting their time and to come back to the house for dinner.

"But I knew I wasn't imagining it. After dinner, I went back outside again, and there was the falcon, still hanging high in the sky. Suddenly, the falcon went into a dive, and didn't come up again. I thought it must have caught something and be eating it on the ground, and where it had dived didn't seem too far away. So I figured I could go and catch it, and prove to my brothers that I'd been telling the truth."

Nile stopped and yawned. "I got to the outskirts of town just as the sun was going down, but I still hadn't seen my falcon rising back up again. Now I was starting to wonder if it was hurt, because I knew that birds like that didn't like to stay on the ground too long, especially as there were a lot of vultures about. So I started scrambling over the rocks, looking for this falcon that had fallen out of the sky."

"So there really was a falcon?" Kyouya asked.

"Well, I thought there was. But as I kept on climbing, I began to wonder if I really had just made it up, and it had just been a figment of my imagination. I knew I was going to be in trouble if I stayed out much longer, so I decided to climb up to the top of the next rock and then give up. Even though it would be very sad, there was nothing more I could do – it was getting really dark, and I couldn't see where I was putting my feet."

"Let me guess – you fell on the rocks and twisted your ankle?"

"No, actually," Nile said, voice echoing ever so slightly in the dark cave. "I managed to get down from that rock absolutely fine. What happened was that I got my bearings wrong, and I came out of the rocks facing the wrong way. My village isn't large, and we don't have electric lights, so I couldn't see where it was. There was no moon either, which didn't help."

"So you're out in the desert, getting lost? And Horuseus rescued you?" Kyouya remembered hearing stories similar to this when he was a child, and had never actually believed them. After all, constellations weren't really there for protection, and only a very few could take a form that was physical enough to actually affect the real world. Pegasus was one – Kyouya had seen him carrying Ryuga and Gingka down from the Battle Bladers tower, and had been more than a little jealous.

"Well... yeah, sort of," Nile agreed. "Though he didn't exactly _rescue_ me. More that I kept walking for hours until I was well and truly lost, and only then remembered that it was possible to navigate by the stars." He shifted again on the rock. "I picked a star that I knew I could see from my bedroom window, lined up with a number of others. Then I just worked my way around until the stars looked about the same to what I remembered, and then started walking that way, figuring that if I could get the stars to look exactly the same as they looked from my room, then I'd be _in_ my room."

Kyouya, who had never tried navigating by stars before, wasn't in much of a position to say how good or bad an idea this was, though Nile's tone suggested that it hadn't been so clever. "What happened?"

"I must have been walking for about three hours when I realised I was getting too tired to keep walking. I knew my parents would be worried sick, and there'd probably be search parties out for me, but I couldn't see the lights anywhere. All I could think of was finding somewhere safe to stop and stay for a few hours, and then to start walking when the sun came up, so that I had a definite direction I could take. So I found a grouping of rocks – not the ones that I'd thought the falcon had fallen in; another set that I found by falling over them in the dark – and hid there. I must have managed to get some sleep, because when I opened my eyes it was getting light. You know there's that moment before dawn when it looks like the sun is coming up and then it doesn't?"

"False dawn? Yeah, of course. That's how I always get up before dawn – because the false dawn wakes me up."

"That was what it was. But it was just light enough for me to see something incredible. It turned out that there was a falcon after all – she was sitting on her nest not five feet from where I was hiding. If I'd taken another step, I might have crushed her and her eggs in the dark. What a falcon was doing nesting in the desert, I will never know, but I knew without being told that it was the same falcon."

Kyouya punched his bag into a more comfortable shape for his head. "What has this got to do with Vulcan Horuseus? Surely you didn't find the blade in her nest?"

"No, no, no!" Nile sounded like he was laughing. "That's just ridiculous. I already had the blade, but there wasn't any constellation in it. What happened was that I forgot about the false dawn, and decided to start walking again so that I could get home and tell my brothers that not only had there really been a falcon, I'd been close enough to touch her. So there I was, walking in the false dawn, and the light started going.

"I knew that I should walk as far as I could before the sun was actually up, so I kept going, trying to find the stars I'd been using before. But I couldn't see them anywhere, not how I was expecting to. Instead, there was a set of stars in the sky that seemed much brighter, much closer than I'd ever seen them before. I'd never seen anything like it.

"Then I began to get this feeling that following that set of stars was the right way to go, which couldn't be right because I knew I couldn't see them from the bedroom window. So I tried to turn towards the direction I thought was right, and the feeling just got stronger and stronger, and the stars got brighter and brighter. Soon they were bright enough to show my shadow on the sand, and they didn't stop. I had my eyes screwed up tight to try and see through the glare, and suddenly I saw this man coming towards me. I... I figured that the light was playing havoc with my eyesight, because it looked like he had the head of a falcon. He came right up to me, so close that I could stare straight into his eyes – they were such a terrible green. He put his hands on my shoulders and turned me slightly to the left, and I had to close my eyes because he was glowing so brightly."

"Hang on," Kyouya said. He might have been getting sleepy, but he could still think straight. "You said that the stars were the ones shining."

"They were," Nile told him. "But the man was shining too, with exactly the same light. Like I said, I closed my eyes, and when I opened them again the man was gone, and so was the light. It was totally dark again. But now I could feel this... this..."

"A sense, deep inside you, like you're being given advice by part of your instincts that you never thought existed," Kyouya breathed. "Like hearing the voice of the stars."

"Exactly." Nile's voice was equally soft. "Then you've guessed what the man was."

"The Horus constellation," Kyouya answered.

"Technically the constellation of Orion – but my people called it Horus. He was telling me which way to go. Turned out I was less than five minutes' walk from my village, but I'd have completely missed it if I'd kept going the way I was. So there it is. That's how I got Horuseus – or, I suppose, how he got me."

"Interesting," Kyouya said with a grin, then yawned. "It's a lot different to how I got Leone."

"Really?" Nile sounded interested but very tired now that his story was over. "Tell me about when you found him."

"Later," Kyouya murmured, yawning again. "Not now... we need sleep if we want to get to the next battle..."

"Mmm," was Nile's articulate response, and moments later the only sound in the cave was the soft snoring of three exhausted boys, and the endless flow of the stream beside them.

* * *

_A/N: It's true - the Ancient Egyptians really used to call the Orion constellation Horus. Which is why, even though I know there is an Orion blade as well, Horuseus comes under it as a constellation as well._


	7. Of Wolves

_Oops... sorry, forgot to upload last night. Next one will be tomorrow, as usual._

* * *

**Chapter 7 – Of Wolves**

"Ow! Drat these sand-flies!"

"You okay there, Nile?"

"Ow. Yeah, I'm fine. These bites itch horribly, though."

Kyouya heard Demure rummaging in his bag. "Here you go," he said. "This should stop it itching so badly."

"Thanks... yeah, that does help! That's amazing."

They had left the poolside cavern early in the morning, and after a long day of walking had finally arrived in the town they were supposed to be in for their semi-final match to become Africa's representatives. Naturally, they had found themselves once again in a bunk room, though this time there were two bunk beds. Demure had suggested that Kyouya might like to take the other top bunk, but Kyouya had just ignored it and settled down on the lower bunk to Nile's. It just felt right by now, like a habit that couldn't be broken.

"Kyouya? Did you get any bites?"

"No." Alright, he was being abrupt, but he had an excuse. Something really rather worrying was bothering him. He'd gone through a couple of warm-up battles with Nile and Demure before their qualifying match that day, and at one point Nile and Demure had teamed up against him. It wasn't that Kyouya had low expectations of his team-mates, who he knew had their own special strengths, but he hadn't expected to struggle so much to defeat them when Demure's pin-point accuracy and blade-reading was combined with Nile's Mystic Zone. This was very bad. He'd seen every qualifying match of Gingka's, and knew that with the new Pegasus the red-head was stronger than ever before. If Kyouya couldn't easily defeat Nile and Demure working together, there was no way that he could hope to challenge Gingka for the World title.

He needed more training, and fast. Wolf Canyon just wasn't enough any more.

"Huh? What was that, Kyouya?"

Oops. He hadn't realised he'd said the last bit out loud. "Nothing, Nile."

"It was something about that place again." Nile leaned over the edge of the top bunk to look at him. "That Wolf Canyon. You've talked about it before."

"I said, it's _nothing,_" Kyouya growled, turning on his side and trying to ignore Nile. But unfortunately for him, the Egyptian boy was far too persistent for his own good.

"You always get a really weird look on your face when you mention that place," he said. "What happened there? And what's it got to do with training?"

He clearly wasn't going to let this one go. "It's just a canyon for training. Nothing more."

Nile didn't look convinced – then again, that wasn't really surprising. He wasn't a fool in any sense of the word. "Oh really? Kyouya, I thought we were team-mates now; can't you at least pretend to not have any deep dark secrets?"

"It's a really long story," Kyouya warned.

"Good," Nile said immediately. "I can't sleep; this might help."

Kyouya groaned to himself. He really needed to work out when he was talking out loud. "Fine. But if you fall asleep in the middle of it I am _not_ going to repeat it."

"Fair enough." Nile settled down into his covers with a creaking of bed-slats. "So... what sort of training do you do in this Wolf Canyon?"

"Endurance training, mostly. Toughness. That sort of thing."

"How'd you find it?"

Kyouya hesitated for a moment. Now was the moment. Either he could tell the whole truth, or he could edit it a little.

But Nile had been honest in telling him the story of Horuseus the previous day, at least as far as Kyouya knew. And... they _were_ team-mates. Lying to a team-mate was equal to betraying them in Kyouya's book.

"I didn't find it," he said at last. "I was taken there. How much do you know about Battle Bladers?"

"Not much," Nile admitted. "It was just in Japan, so I didn't take much notice. The winner was that Gingka Hagane, wasn't he?"

So Kyouya told him the story of Battle Bladers, and of the orchestrator of the whole event, Doji, including how the two of them had met just after Kyouya's first defeat at the hands of Gingka.

"And you went _with_ him?" Nile asked, aghast. "But..."

"I didn't know," Kyouya sighed. "It was the first time I'd ever seen him, and it was months and months before Battle Bladers. Trust me, if I'd known what he intended I would never have gone with him." Then he stopped and thought, because that wasn't exactly true. Hindsight was a wonderful thing to have, but now that he remembered how desperate he had been to defeat Gingka – and how desperate he was to beat the red-head now – even if he'd known what Doji had intended to do with him when he lost, he would still have taken the training. After all, it had been _very_ good training, world-class in terms of how much stronger it had made him. And, of course, it had led him to Wolf Canyon.

"So...how did he persuade you? You're not exactly the sort of guy who'd go looking for help."

"Hah! As if." Kyouya spat. "I got overconfident and cocky. He took me and my gang up into the mountains and... I ended up challenging him. I should have realised that he had something up his sleeve, because he'd picked a place that gave me a huge advantage over him. I knew he was no fool, and I knew he'd been watching me for a while, so I should have been able to see that he was toying with me. He let me bounce attacks off his blade for a while, and then just wiped the floor with me. It was..."

"Humiliating? Embarrassing?"

"Painful." Kyouya's voice was quiet. "His constellation was one of the Dark constellations; Dark Wolf. It had no sense of... of restraint. It used everything it had even if it didn't have to.

"So I had to go with him. My gang went back to town, and I ended up in the Dark Nebula training facility. I... I don't really know how long I was there, exactly; everything sort of blurred."

"I did a desert endurance course once," Nile commented suddenly. "One week of training in the desert with bladers from all across Africa. By the end it felt like a month had passed. It's just so..."

"So much work all at once," Kyouya agreed, staring at the slats above his head. "That's exactly it. Precision, endurance, strength-training, concentration, aggression... I was doing all of it, and I just threw myself into it, because I _had _to defeat Gingka. I remember one of the scientists saying that I was completing things in two-thirds of the time they were expecting."

"Hah. That definitely sounds like you. I'm surprised that it wasn't half the time, but I guess you weren't as strong then as you are now."

That made Kyouya stop for a moment. Although he was still slightly wary of trusting someone else's judgement entirely, time and time again over the past few days Nile had proved to be remarkably perceptive. When they had been warming up that morning, Nile had spotted a weak place in Demure's defence and was exploiting it almost before Kyouya had realised it was there. And now it seemed that he was capable of analysing Kyouya's behaviour from a year ago, simply on what he had been told.

Kyouya rolled onto his side to hide the smile he could feel creeping onto his face (not that anyone could see it in the dark anyway) and continued "The very last thing I had to do was face Wolf Canyon. It's a deep ravine miles outside of the town I lived in, and there's only one way in or out – plane or helicopter. Doji took me there and parachuted me in, then my task was to climb out of it. He said it... it would give me _fangs of the heart._"

"What're those when they're around?"

"It's... it's about proving yourself against a seemingly impossible challenge. Becoming a true warrior. No-one had ever climbed out of that ravine before, and it was pretty possible that I was going to die there."

"Nah. Not you. You're too fierce."

"So were the wolves."

"Oh. Right." For once, Kyouya thought he might have actually managed to shock Nile. "So... that's why it's called Wolf Canyon, then?"

"Yeah. Not as if Doji decided to tell me that before he dropped me in there, though."

"Fun," Nile remarked. "You managed to get out, though."

"Yeah... it took a long time, and a lot of falls, but I did it."

For a long time, there was silence in the room, broken only by snores from the room next door. Finally, after what seemed like hours, Nile said "And that was it?"

Once again, Kyouya was caught between telling the truth or a half-truth. "Sort of," he said heavily. "I know that Kyouya went in... but I'm not sure Kyouya came out."

"Meaning? Come on, Kyouya, I'm too tired for riddles."

"I changed, in that valley." Kyouya's voice was soft, and he couldn't help letting a hint of regret slide into it. "At first, it wasn't for the better... and then perhaps it was... and then Leone came through, and it really was alright. Wolf Canyon doesn't just test your muscles and your stamina – it tests your mind and your heart as well. If you don't have complete control, it'll break you – but once you've got control, it's easy. Before I left to come here, I climbed it again, this time with weights strapped to my arms, and though it wasn't a walk in the park it wasn't anywhere near what I needed it to be."

"Which is why you need another place to train?"

"Yeah..." Kyouya fell silent, and after a long moment heard Nile snuggle further into his blankets.

"Well, I can't think of anywhere at the moment, but we can ask Demure tomorrow. I'm sure that between us we'll think of something. After all, we are a team. Good night, Kyouya."

"Good night, Nile," Kyouya answered automatically. But he didn't sleep.

In the end, he hadn't been able to tell Nile the whole story. He couldn't tell him about the way every muscle in his body had burned at the halfway mark, or about the bruises that covered him from head to foot for days afterwards from the falls. He couldn't tell him about the moment three quarters of the way up when he had lost hope, when nothing seemed worthwhile except letting go of the cliff – and how he would have done so if he hadn't remembered _why_ he was climbing the cliff. He hadn't told him about the fall that could have killed him if he hadn't used his ripcord to tangle round the rocks above him. He hadn't told him about the wolves.

Most of all, he couldn't tell Nile about the moment when something deep inside him had cracked, releasing an icy flood that swamped his blader spirit until he either couldn't or wouldn't listen to Leone even when his constellation was screaming at him to stop what he was doing. It had numbed him to every joy that blading had ever brought to him, all except the delight in destruction which he had never allowed before. Wolf Canyon had torn him apart, and all that he had been able to think of was tearing the rest of the world apart to match.

The canyon still held an edge of terror for him, if only because he knew he could never climb it the same way as he had the first time. If he ever lost control of himself like that again, he wasn't fit to call himself a blader.

There was so much of himself that he kept hidden, like a lion keeping its claws sheathed in its paws. Some secrets were his alone, and there they would stay.

After all, Nile didn't really need to know about Kyouya's failures. He and Nile weren't _friends._ They were just team-mates; nothing more.


	8. Friends in Need

**Chapter 8 – Friends in Need**

Kyouya rolled himself up in his blankets, feeling the now-familiar aches and twinges in his arms and legs that spoke of muscles relaxing at the end of a hard day's work. Once again, the team had defeated their opponents with no difficulty, and were heading straight for the African final. There could be no doubt by now that Team Wild Fang was a force to be reckoned with.

To his great surprise, at the end of the battle that day a very familiar figure had rushed over to him and crushed him in a hug that took every scrap of breath out of his body. "Kyouya, buddy, where have you _been?"_ Benkei had yelled, apparently unconcerned by the attention he was getting. "No-one knew where you were, and I had to ask Hikaru _and_ Gingka's dad to find out that you were coming here, b-b-b-bull!"

"Put me _down!"_

Benkei had, thankfully, obeyed instantly, so Kyouya managed to prevent his ribs from breaking. However, he refused point-blank to go home when ordered, insisting instead that he remained with Kyouya and the others (in "disguise" so that no-one would recognise him. Kyouya was not convinced by any means).

So now Team Wild Fang had its fourth member, however unofficial it might be. Nile had manage to get in contact with the president of Savannah to report their progress and to ask if Benkei could officially join the team, and they were still waiting for an answer. However, in light of their recent successes, the president had promised that they could have some more money to get rooms and food, so they were a bit better off. Had Benkei not arrived, it would have been enough to get a room with three beds rather than a bunk room, but with the "Masked Bull"'s appetite to deal with as well as their own, they were stuck in the oh-so-familiar layout. The only difference was that there were once again two bunks instead of one, and that Benkei was asleep on the bottom of the other, with Demure above him. No-one trusted the top bunk with Benkei's weight.

"You happy with the training now, captain?" Nile's voice floated down. "Demure did a good job finding that Valley of Storms."

"I'm captain now?"

"Yeah, I guess you are. You're the toughest of all of us, and I know you want the title as badly as the rest of us do. Plus, I can't accuse you of being the only Japanese guy anymore."

"Heheh. Suppose so." Kyouya sighed happily. Today had been a good day.

"Looking forwards to the match tomorrow?" Nile asked. "Shouldn't be too hard to get rid of this last team, and then we're into the second round of the World Championships!"

"Yeah, I know," Kyouya mused. "And then in the third round we'll face _him."_

"Gingka." Nile knew without asking that this was who Kyouya meant. "But what about the others? What do you know about them?"

"Aren't we getting a bit ahead of ourselves?" Demure asked from the other bunk, leaning up on one elbow. "We've got another two battles to win before that one."

"Might as well give it some thought," Nile pointed out. "The more we know, the better prepared we can be. Who else is on Gan Gan Galaxy's team?"

"Gingka's the leader," Kyouya said at once. "Masamune Kadoya and Tsubasa Otori are the two other regulars. Yuu Tendo is the sub, and Madoka Amano is their mechanic."

"They have a mechanic?" Demure said.

"Madoka fixes the beys when they get damaged, and handles all the official stuff for the team," Kyouya explained. "She's the best mechanic I know, and that's saying a lot."

"You know her, then?" Nile asked, curious. "Did you meet her before you left?"

"Apart from Masamune, I know all of Gan Gan Galaxy," Kyouya answered. "They went through Battle Bladers with me last year. Don't underestimate any of them, especially Gingka and Tsubasa."

"Really?" From the sounds of it, Nile was sitting up in bed, probably leaning over the edge to see Kyouya's eyes in the dimness. "I heard reports that he was getting sick and that his blading was suffering."

Kyouya hesitated. It was true that in his battle against the Eagle Tsubasa had certainly been acting unusually, even to the point that Kyouya had begun to worry. But getting sick? Surely not.

"You can't believe everything you hear," he said.

"Hmph." Nile snorted and flopped back onto his mattress. "Alright then, you tell me about them."

"Gingka you don't need to know about – he's _mine."_

"Okay, okay, fine. Tell me about Tsubasa; he's the oldest, isn't he?"

"Yes, and he's more dangerous than he looks. His blade is a combination of defence and stamina, so he can take a lot of hits and still be able to keep going for hours."

"Oh, I've seen those," Demure said. "Those are the heaviest blades, aren't they?"

But Kyouya shook his head. "Not true of Eagle. It's amazingly fast and agile, with all the swiftness and power of a real eagle, and Tsubasa himself is a master of tactics. Give him the slightest opportunity and he'll crush you with a single blow."

"Master of tactics, huh?" Nile smiled. "That sounds interesting."

"Hey, that's my line!" Kyouya protested.

"Whatever. Is there anything else I need to know about him?"

Kyouya thought for a moment, remembering a conversation held many months ago inside the Battle Bladers stadium, just before that battle when Tsubasa had come so close to defeating the threat of L-Drago. He had seen a kindred spirit that day, across the stadium, and no matter what Tsubasa was doing now, and no matter what might be affecting him, Kyouya respected him deeply.

"Tsubasa is a fine blader and a good man," he said at last. "Don't underestimate him, or you will regret it."

He couldn't see Nile's smile, but he could hear it as the Egyptian blader asked "So what about Yuu?"

"I don't know him so well," Kyouya explained. "He was a member of Dark Nebula. But – and this is important – he beat Gingka and Pegasus last year, and would have destroyed Leone if... well, if Madoka hadn't... whatever. He's very, very strong if you let him use his special move, and that move has only been broken twice, as far as I know." He bit his lip as a thought occurred to him. "But you can always distract him with ice-cream."

"With _what?"_

"Yuu loves ice-cream almost as much as he loves blading," Kyouya said, trying not to smile - but he might as well have not bothered, because Nile burst out laughing.

"Ice-cream? Seriously? What kind of a team is this?"

"A very good one," Kyouya responded immediately. "And don't forget that they've got Gingka. He can pull extraordinary victories out of catastrophic defeats just by hearing his friends cheering for him."

"Gan Gan Galaxy - they're all your friends, aren't they?" Nile's quiet question was far too close to home. "They used to cheer for you."

"That doesn't matter," Kyouya said quickly. "I left them behind to come here; I left them so that I could beat Gingka. And I _will_ do it, Nile, I swear."

"I don't know where my friends are," Nile said, sounding as though he wasn't quite in the present. "There was a bunch of us back in my village who used to blade together, but I was the only one good enough to make anything of it. They promised they'd cheer for me if I got through. Wonder how they're doing."

Kyouya didn't answer.

"And my family said they'd cheer, of course. My brother said he'd cheer so loudly that I'd be able to hear it on the moon. You're a lot like him, actually, Kyouya. Maybe that's why I didn't get on with you when I met you. I wish he could have come here, though. Bet you and him would have got along like a house on fire. What about you, Kyouya? Have you got anyone cheering for you in Japan?"

But there was still no answer from the lower bunk. Assuming that his team-mate was asleep, Nile left it.

He was wrong.


	9. Fame and Fortune

**Chapter 9 – Fame and Fortune**

"We're going to the final, we're going to the finaaaal!" Benkei carolled as he burst through the hotel door. "We're the awesome Team Wild Fang, and we're going to the fiiiinaaaaaal!"

"It's just the third round final," Nile laughed, throwing his bag onto the top bunk as usual. "It's not even the A-Block final."

"So? We're up against Gan Gan Galaxy next, b-b-b-bull!"

It was their last night in India. The boat to Japan – and the third-round battle – left early the next morning. Nile had actually requested a room with bunk beds in the hotel, and in their cabin on the boat, which had made Kyouya laugh.

"This is definitely a habit, Nile," he said, stretching out on the bottom bunk. "What are you going to do when the team disbands?"

"Hah! Like that's going to happen!" Nile laughed. "We'll just stay together, won't we?"

But to his surprise, Kyouya just said "I guess..." and tucked his hands behind his head, ignoring the rest of the world.

"What do you think, Demure?" Nile asked. "We'll stick together, huh?"

"Of course!" the other exclaimed. "We're the team fighting Gan Gan Galaxy on their home ground for a place in the A-Block finals; Wild Fang will go down in history!"

"Those Chandora guys never stood a chance!" Benkei grinned. "Not against my buddy Kyouya! Though you were awesome too, Nile."

"Damned with faint praise," Nile responded, laughing as he swung himself up to the top bunk. "But you see what I mean about tactics, Kyouya? They changed their battle order when they realised they were losing."

"I like our tactics," Kyouya protested lazily. "See opponent, beat opponent. Works for me."

"And you managed to give Gingka a personal challenge too," Nile grinned. "Wonder who I'm gonna be up against?"

"If they play the same as they have done, it'll be Masamune, though that's only based on their first-round match – remember that he went missing when they were in Russia?"

"Maybe he'll do that again," Nile answered. "I wouldn't mind - I've been looking forward to battling Tsubasa."

Demure perched on the edge of his bed, swinging his legs. "What about Yuu? I saw his special move, and it's very powerful."

"Yes," Kyouya said. "Remember what I said the other night? If that thing hits you, you're all but done for."

"Hmm," Nile mused. "Masamune... he's the one who thinks he's the "number one blader", isn't he?"

"That's him," said Benkei with a sigh. "It gets really annoying!"

Nile felt a thrill of challenge run through him. "Maybe something needs to take him down a peg or two, then," he suggested. "I'd love to. After all, he can't know he's the best in the world if there hasn't been a tournament to decide that yet."

"So what about Tsubasa?" Demure asked, sounding worried. "I'm good at analysing stuff, but if he's as strong as you say he is, Kyouya, I don't think I'll be able to beat him."

"You won't need to," Kyouya said immediately. "Nile will destroy that Masamune and then I'll take down Gingka. With two wins, Tsubasa and Yuu won't even get a look in."

"Well, as long as you're confident," Demure muttered.

"I am. That move that I used on Chandora's captain wasn't even close to my full power. You'll see."

Demure and Nile exchanged glances. Both of them knew that Kyouya was far more powerful than either of them, and since their journey to the Valley of Storms, he had only become stronger. The balance of power within the team was very heavily weighted towards Kyouya being able to take down the strongest member of the opposing team, whilst Nile handled the second-strongest, and Demure analysed them from the side before the battles started to decide who should face whom. Benkei, it seemed, was there purely for aesthetic reasons (though Nile had to admit, watching him take on the press conference with all the delicacy of... well, of a bull in a china shop had been extremely funny).

"I got a call from the president of Savannah today," Demure said suddenly. "I've only just remembered. He said to tell you that all of Savannah is cheering for us in our battles, and all of Africa will join in."

"All of Africa, hmm?" Nile said softly. "Hope that my friends are watching this. It's gonna be awesome."

"I wonder who Kenta will be cheering for back in Japan?" Benkei asked the room in general.

"Gingka," came Kyouya's slightly bitter response. "Everyone always cheers for him. That's why he wins."

"Oh come on, Kyouya buddy," Benkei objected. "That's not true. _I_ cheer for you."

Nile swore that he heard a rather inelegant snort coming from the bunk below him. "Thanks."

"There must be some people back in Japan who will cheer for you," Nile pointed out. "I've never seen a battle where the entire stadium was cheering for just one blader – well, except for that one against Chandora, which was cheating anyway because it was a home match."

"No," Benkei said stubbornly. "Gingka and his friends were there, cheering for us!"

"Are you deaf in that Masked Bull outfit, Benkei?" Kyouya's voice was irritated and sharp. "There's a distinct difference between cheering for someone and just not cheering for their opponent."

"Shows who they wanted to win, though," Nile answered, relaxing. "Come on, Kyouya. You're not the sort of guy that I'd expect to get bothered by little things like whether the people in the stadium are on his side or not. Didn't you say once that blading is a solo thing for you? No-one in the dish except you and the opponent?"

He heard Kyouya shift on the lower bunk, but the owner of Leone didn't say anything else. However, if there was one thing that Nile had become very good at over the past weeks and months, it was reading Kyouya's silences. This one was heavy with unspoken thoughts that whirled around his team-mate, bars caging a lion.

It seemed that the other two hadn't noticed. "We should get to sleep," Demure yawned. "After all, our boat is leaving at eight and we need to be at the terminal at half six."

There was a general agreement, and for about five minutes the room was chaotic as four people tried to manoeuvre around each other to get ready for bed without causing injury to anyone else there. Eventually, though, everyone was safely tucked in under their blankets.

Nile waited in silence until he heard Demure's breathing deepen and slow as he fell into sleep, then said softly, "Kyouya."

"Huh? What is it, Nile?"

"Talk."

There was a soft growl from underneath. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Yes, you do. There's something bothering you about the battle against Gan Gan Galaxy, and I want to know what it is."

"It's _nothing,_" Kyouya snarled. "I'm perfectly capable of looking after myself, Nile, as you well know. Now go to sleep. Demure was right, we'll need the rest."

If he thought that Nile was going to be put off by that, he was sorely mistaken. "Kyouya, you're my team-mate. If there's something about the battle that's got you worried, I need to know. As your _team-mate."_

There was a very long silence, this one full of spikes. Clearly, Kyouya really didn't want to talk to him, and that hurt a bit. After all, Nile had become used to hearing Kyouya's stories at night; things about Japanese life, about past battles that he had taken part in, and very occasionally hints at the things that had happened whilst he was the leader of the Face Hunters. In return, Nile had told Kyouya about his village; about his family and their customs, about making the palm-oil that they sold to the neighbouring towns, about learning to blade with the other boys and girls from the village, and a hundred other small details that helped him remember where he had come from – and where he was aiming for. Kyouya knew more about Nile now than anyone outside his family, but it seemed that Nile still had a lot to learn about the Lion pretending to sleep below him.

"It's not the battle that I'm thinking about," Kyouya's voice sounded annoyed when it eventually cut through the night air. "If that was it, I'd just go out and train until I was certain."

"What is it, then? Come on, Kyouya, tell me. Maybe I can think of something to help."

Kyouya actually laughed, but it was bitter and ironic. "I sincerely doubt that."

Something in Nile's mind rankled at that. "Try me."

It said something for the respect that Kyouya had for Nile that he answered, however unwillingly. "It's not the battle, not _exactly. _It's nothing to do with me, or you, or anything like that. It's... it's the crowd."

And it said something much more about the respect that Nile had for Kyouya that he didn't laugh. "The crowd? You've said many, many times that the crowd doesn't bother you at all. You ignore them, because hearing someone yelling for you doesn't help you."

"It helps Gingka. It helps Gingka a lot."

Oh. So that was where the problem was. "Is... Is this about what happened with Team Chandora?"

"In a way. I've never heard a stadium chanting for only one team before."

"Me neither," Nile admitted, watching the ceiling and concentrating on every word that Kyouya was saying. He had a feeling that this might be the only time that the Lion allowed him so close.

"I didn't care that they were cheering for the opponents," Kyouya said slowly. "That happens all the time. What bothered me was that some of them were cheering _against_ us, pushing our team down. There were matches when I was... when I was younger, when one blader would lose just because of the crowd."

"That's not... I refuse to believe that such a small thing is bothering you," Nile told him firmly, and he was being completely honest. Kyouya was a ferocious blader who cared about nothing but the win once he was inside the stadium. It was amazing to watch.

"I can beat Gingka under almost any circumstances," Kyouya said clearly. "But make no mistake, he is a phenomenal blader, and he just gets better when the crowd cheers for him. If the crowd is on his side as much as they were on Chandora's side, then I doubt that there's _anything_ that could defeat him. He defeated Ryuga and L-Drago purely because there were people cheering him on."

Nile shrugged, though he knew Kyouya couldn't see him. "So? They won't be just cheering for Gingka. You're Japanese, like him, so they'll cheer for you too."

To his utter shock, Kyouya laughed. It wasn't a pleasant laugh – it sounded more like a snarl. "That's what you'd think, isn't it?"

"Then tell me." Nile put every scrap of sincerity he could muster into his voice. "Let me understand."

Another of those long, familiar silences fell, and Nile could almost hear Kyouya thinking. At last, the Lion said "It goes back a long way. I was... I was very young when I started blading, and though I had Leone, he wasn't really... I don't know how to describe it. He wasn't in my blade, or I couldn't use him. I knew he was there, though, because I could hear him, and sometimes he would give me advice on what to do, or where to attack from. But he never emerged from the blade, not like he does now."

"So what happened to change that?"

"I'm getting to that. I started off battling some fr – some people I knew, but I was worse than useless. If I even managed to launch properly I wasn't nearly strong enough to keep going in the battles, so to begin with I lost a lot."

"Didn't your friends cheer you on from the sidelines?" Nile asked. He hadn't missed the word Kyouya had changed.

"I didn't say they were friends," Kyouya snapped. "And even if they were then, they weren't afterwards. They didn't bother cheering for me, no matter how hard a battle it was. I don't know why, maybe they just thought that a little four- or five-year-old who could barely launch a blade straight wasn't really worth cheering for." He took a deep breath. "I was about to give up completely when one of the strongest bladers in town came by. He gave all of us a challenge – any of us who could beat him could take his place at the upcoming championships. But if we lost to him, we wouldn't be allowed to enter any tournaments that year.

"I wasn't going to be entering any tournaments that year anyway, so I hadn't intended to accept, but he picked me out first. I managed to launch properly, thank goodness, but I was losing badly right from the start. I could hear all these whispers behind me. No-one thought I could win."

Nile wondered silently just how much of his pride Kyouya had swallowed to tell him the story. "But you won, right?"

"I'm not sure," Kyouya said, his voice mystified. "I just remember being halfway through the battle and suddenly wanting to win more than I ever had before. There was this huge flash of green light and a rush of wind, and then I realised that the other blade was sailing out of the dish, and burying itself in a tree. I couldn't understand it at all, not until I looked up, and saw Leone standing there. He'd... he'd fought his way out of the blade - just to fight with me, to stand by me."

Now Nile could understand the mystery and the echo of joy in Kyouya's voice. It was exactly the same as he had felt three years ago when Horuseus had put his hands on his shoulders. It was a deep, inexplicable feeling that all bladers shared, whether they knew it or not, a feeling that formed the basis of their blader spirits and fuelled their desire to win.

"After that," Kyouya continued, "things changed. I'd pulled off such a spectacular win that suddenly everyone was either in awe of the win or wanted to challenge me - or both. I beat them all easily, using the power that Leone has and learning as I did so how to harness the winds for the first time. It wasn't long before I had quite a following of people who were expecting me to win every battle.

"But that was just the thing. They expected me to win; they still do. Benkei, the Face Hunters, hundreds of old opponents – they just expect me to win, so they don't cheer. They just sit and watch in admiration and don't bother thinking that I can do more. Leone's the only one who'll ever push me on beyond what I can do normally."

"So that's it." In the light of sudden understanding, Nile didn't even realise he was speaking aloud. "That's why you always say that you're alone in the dish – because you are. There's no-one behind you, just an opponent in front of you and your constellation next to you. I get it now."

Kyouya made a strange harrumphing sound and tugged the blankets up around his shoulders. "I've said enough. So, _can_ you do anything about it, Nile? Or was I right?"

"There'll be people cheering for you," Nile said immediately. "And if there aren't, then I'm sure that Demure, Benkei and I can be a home crowd for you. We'll cheer for you, really loudly, and then you'll be much better than you normally are. It'll help you, like it does Gingka. Then there's no way you can lose."

The silence was sudden and horrible, and Nile knew instinctively that he had said something terribly, terribly wrong. He heard Kyouya draw in a deep breath.

"I don't need people to cheer for me," he said slowly, an awful tone in his voice, "I have absolutely no need for useless yelling and wasting of energy, and I certainly don't need _help."_

"That wasn't what I meant, Kyouya..." Nile began, but Kyouya cut him off.

"And my _'home crowd'_ is in Japan, Nile, cheering for Gingka. After all, as you have taken great pains to point out at every opportunity, I'm the odd one out, the one who isn't in the right place, regardless. I'm the one who has no-one, anywhere, because _I am the only active Japanese blader on the African team_."

And, to Nile's horror, he heard the bed below him creak as Kyouya slid off it, then the click of the door handle and the soft whisper for the door over the carpet as the Lion strode out into the night.

* * *

_Two more chapters left..._

_As a couple of people have noted in reviews, this does stick to canon as closely as I can make it. I've often considered fanfiction to be a way of "plugging the gaps" in stories, which is why I will always stick to canon and weave it as realistically as possible into my stories. If it makes you look at what is presented in the original story in a different way - however subtly - after reading this, then I have succeeded, and I will be very happy._


	10. Too Quiet

**Chapter 10 – Too Quiet**

The ship dipped into a wave, sending it in green crests up her sides. But she was too large for such a small thing to make much of an impact, and the three occupants of Cabin 473, deep in the heart of the ship, barely felt the slight rise and fall.

They were rather too occupied with other thoughts, anyway. Benkei was sobbing theatrically on his bottom bunk, whilst Demure and Nile were trying their hardest to ignore him, and to work out exactly what they should do now. Nile's quicksilver mind was running through every possible situation that they might end up in, and none of them were especially good. In fact, he couldn't think of any way out of their current situation.

On waking that morning, the remnants of Team Wild Fang had discovered that Kyouya was still missing. In fact, they didn't see him at all until Demure's sharp eyes picked him out from across the ship's lounge, reading a book and ignoring the world in general. He hadn't responded at all when Benkei and Demure had tried to talk to him (Nile was too afraid of saying something stupid like he had the previous evening to attempt it) and when they had finally retreated to their cabin, they had found that Kyouya had not followed them. After a couple of hours, a concerned Nile had gone to ask one of the stewards, who managed to find Kyouya's name on the passenger log and told him that Mr Tategami had requested a separate cabin a couple of hours before the ship had left port.

Nile had returned to Cabin 473 dispirited and sullen, and had gone straight to his bunk to think. Why? Why had Kyouya so suddenly decided that he didn't want to stay with them? Of course, Nile had obviously said something daft the day before, but he'd said a lot of daft things before and this hadn't happened. Was it nerves? Or something worse?

"Nile, d'you think Kyouya will come back to fight with us?" Demure asked quietly. Nile sighed and shrugged uncomfortably.

"I've got no idea, Demure. We'll just have to wait and see."

Demure hunched his shoulders forward. "I just wish we could do something... do you know why he's acting like this?"

Oh, Nile knew alright. "Um... it might have been something I said to him," he admitted. "I just said that we'd cheer for him in the match against Gingka and he all but stormed out. He said something about not wanting any help."

"Well, that much is obvious," Demure muttered. "Kyouya never _wants _help."

"I just don't get why he's so stubborn about fighting alone. If I were him, and I knew my opponent got stronger with help, I'd take whatever I could to beat him."

Demure was still staring at the floor. "Maybe that's it. He's never had help before, so he just doesn't know how to accept it. And anyway, it's not like we can do a huge amount for him – just... hope. And cheer, even if he doesn't want it."

Nile lay back on his bunk, uncomfortably aware of the empty place underneath. Kyouya had been right – this had become a habit, and it was horrible having it broken. It felt like the team itself was falling apart again. "I wish there was some way we could get him back, but if he won't talk to us we don't have a hope."

Silence fell between them, and Nile couldn't read it, even though he was the one who began it. That was an even more uncomfortable feeling than the empty bunk.

"There... there may be a way," Demure said hesitantly. "I'm not sure if it'll work, but..."

"Anything's better than nothing," Nile retorted. "Go on. How would the hunter from the tribes of Africa go about capturing the Lion?"

.

Cabin 332 was very quiet. There were two beds in there, but only one of them was occupied, and that particular occupant wasn't keen on moving too much or making any noise.

Kyouya _hated_ boats. At least, he hated them insofar as they seemed to hate him, by making his stomach tie itself into knots and his legs go horribly shaky. He had been dreading this boat ride anyway, and now it was even worse.

A tiny, tiny part of him pointed out that he could easily go and knock on the door of the other cabin and be let back in, but that felt too much like giving in. Even if Nile's stories about his village and his family could take Kyouya's mind off feeling seasick, it would break the self-imposed solitude he had set up around himself.

He needed to concentrate for the battle, and he needed to be alone. After all, he would be alone in the dish, so he needed to get used to it again after so long spent in the company of his team. Yes, there had been other battles, but none like this one. Gingka would be assisted by the entire crowd, so Kyouya needed to be absolutely certain of himself, and of his own prodigious strength, in order to win.

Kyouya took a deep breath and willed himself to stay perfectly still, the eye of the storm. He was strong, proud and fierce, free from any ties that might bind him to anyone else. He was a young lion cast out from his original pride, alone and fighting his way to the top and gaining all the awe and respect and terror that he was due – as long as he stayed alive, and kept winning. And sooner or later, he would win against a truly strong opponent, and gain his own pride to defend from all comers. He had thought that he had found it in the Face Hunters, who had followed his every order to the letter and had won vast amounts of points for him. But then Doji had come along, and Kyouya's leadership had been shaken and broken, along with his faith in his ability to keep them safe. Disbanding them had been the only option after that.

Now he was an outcast again, this time of his own making, and he had to fight every battle to remain alive and respected, or else he would lose any chance he ever had of finding a world-class team to call his.

That was the one thing that scared Kyouya. He had been afraid of it for so long that he'd forgotten how frightened of it he was. But now it was back, and roaring in his face, and he hated it.

He was afraid that if he lost, if he fell and failed to meet people's expectations, he would never be able to get back up again. It was simple, really. He had seen hundreds of people throughout his life get cheered on to unbelievable victories, and all the while the ones who were supporting him just expected greatness from him. It was fine whilst he was winning, because simply that fact of knowing there were people in the crowds who were expecting him to win was enough to spur him on, but if he lost and that expectation was shattered, no-one would cheer him on to a come-back victory. No-one ever had.

Except... except that one moment in the battle against Ryuga, when he had heard his own name being screamed above the howling winds, reminding him that there were people who were relying on him and hoping for his victory against a triplicate dragon with too much power.

Not expecting. _Hoping._

He hadn't realised there was such a difference until that moment, and it had been a bit of a shock. But things like that couldn't help you win a battle. Being stronger than your opponent did that.

There was a soft sound outside the door, and Kyouya sat up, alarmed. It had sounded like someone pushing against the door handle, trying to get in. Well, if that was Demure or Benkei again, they could just stay out there. He did _not_ want to be dealing with Benkei's exuberance on top of being seasick.

The sounds died away almost as quickly as they had come, footsteps receding up the passageway. Kyouya was about to collapse back onto his mattress when he noticed something small and white out of the corner of his eye.

There was an envelope lying on the floor just inside the door, which hadn't been there earlier. It had his name on it. Frowning, Kyouya got up, picked it up and carried it back to his bed, slitting it open with a finger and tipping the contents out. There was a piece of paper wrapped around a strangely shaped piece of plastic – Kyouya recognised it as a cabin door key - and that was all. Puzzled and secretly more than a little curious, Kyouya unfolded the paper to reveal a scrawl of words written in blue biro on the inside.

.

_Kyouya,_

_I know that nothing I can say will make you change your mind about how you want to – and will - blade. Goodness knows, I've already tried. To be honest, I don't care, either. You're stubborn and strong, and that's good for the team. But maybe it's not so good for you. _

_You told me that you faced Wolf Canyon alone, with only Leone beside you to challenge the wolves. You said you came out different, and you didn't sound as if you were happy about that. Now you are heading into another canyon, and not of the same type, but you will come out different nonetheless._

_May I suggest that this time, though, there will be more than just Leone to help you through. I know we can't be a crowd roaring your name as you once wanted, and I know that you wouldn't want that if we could do it, but we are your team; you have me, and Demure, and Benkei. We are, after all, your team-mates._

_No matter what you might think, there will be five people in the dish in two days' time when you battle Gingka. Gingka will not be fighting Kyouya – he will fight Team Wild Fang. Maybe there will only be one blade, but you will be carrying all our thoughts and our hopes to get to the final and be declared the best bladers in the world. I know that you will not let us down, and so we shall not let you down._

_If you have read to here, then I must have achieved something. There's still an empty bunk in Cabin 473._

_N._

_._

Kyouya read the letter once, then again, and then crumpled it into a ball in his fist. _Nile._ What was it about the guy that kept him so hopeful, and stopped him from giving up? Surely it wasn't something as ridiculous as _friends._ That was Gingka's line, anyway. Kyouya had enough experience of how much that could help – he'd eventually blocked out the yells of support from Gingka and the others in his battle against Ryuga, because he had be determined to face the Dragon on his own, and on his own terms. Friends didn't win you battles. Being the strongest did that.

And Kyouya was the strongest. He _had _to be, because otherwise there was no point in him facing Gingka.

But he couldn't pull his mind away from the letter. _You are heading into another canyon, and you will come out different._ How could Nile write something so preposterous – and yet something that sent shivers down Kyouya's spine and echoed in his mind long after the paper was screwed up in the bin?

.

Nile was drifting on the edge of sleep, his quick mind losing focus and letting go of the problems he had been battling all day. Tomorrow was a new day, and they would be one step closer to his dream – _their _dream – of being the best bladers in the world, no matter what state his team was in.

But just before he fell into true sleep, he heard a strange sound; a soft click like someone setting their blade into a launcher in preparation for an attack – or like a door being unlocked and opened with tremendous care so as to not wake the occupants of the room.

The bunk below him moved slightly and let out a quiet creak. Cloth rustled, and then all was still.

Nile smiled.


	11. Team Wild Fang

**Chapter 11 – Team Wild Fang**

"Rewind that bit of film, Benkei? Yeah, that bit just there – pause it!"

"Ooh... it's so pretty! All those lovely lights!"

"Benkei, can't you keep it down? Kyouya and I are trying to work over here!"

"Sorry, Nile buddy."

"Kyouya, can you look here a second? That's the moment when Yuu's special attack is about to start. See that green light right at the tip? That's where it starts from, so an aerial attack right then should manage to knock it off balance and then the whole attack should be thrown off. Isn't that how Masamune managed in the selection tournament?"

"As far as I can remember, yes. Good work, Demure. Nile, what do you think of this...?"

There were twelve hours left before the first match between Wild Fang and Gan Gan Galaxy, and the room was buzzing with excitement. Kyouya and Nile were sitting on the floor with Horuseus in pieces in front of them, giving it one final check-over together. Benkei and Demure were crouched over the small TV set in the corner, watching the past battles of their upcoming opponents, analysing every move. Benkei had been a brilliant source of information about Masamune and Striker, and combined with his knowledge of the few Championship battles that the unicorn bey had fought in and Demure's phenomenal eyesight to pick out every detail on the film clips, it meant that Nile was more prepared to face Masamune than any other opponent ever had been.

"We should probably consider the worst," Nile said to Kyouya, who was polishing Horuseus' fusion wheel. "I know that Masamune is very strong, and you know that Gingka is very lucky. If we do end up going to the final match, is Demure going to be okay?"

Demure, hearing his name, turned round to see what was happening. "Depends who I'm against," he said. "The news said that Tsubasa stepped down from having single matches a couple of times to let Yuu battle with him in tandem, and in Russia he seemed to be fighting something, more than just his opponent. No-one's sure why, but lots of journalists are saying that he's looked really pale in a lot of the press conferences and at the battles, and they think he's ill and trying to hide it."

Kyouya flapped a hand dismissively. "Even if Tsubasa's half dead, he's still a powerful opponent," he warned.

"That's not what Demure meant," Nile interrupted. "He meant that if Tsubasa's in the habit of sharing matches with Yuu where he can, then we should think about a team-up too."

Kyouya raised his eyebrows. "Go on, then, Mr Strategy-And-Tactics. I can tell that you've got an idea already."

Nile looked a bit embarrassed. "Am I really that transparent?" he asked the room in general.

"No," Kyouya grinned. "I just know you well, that's all. Now, who were you thinking of?"

"Demure and Benkei," Nile said immediately. "Benkei's Dark Bull is exactly like a bull – all full of power and rage, and with only the vaguest hint of direction. Put Demure in control of that, and get Dark Bull hitting precisely with the full power he's got, and I'm willing to bet that neither Tsubasa nor Yuu could stand up to it for any length of time."

"We're not likely to need them to battle," Kyouya began, but once again Nile interrupted him.

"I'd only use them if we had to. If they request a pairs match for one of the matches, we'll take it to them. But considering that Masamune challenged me, and you've got Gingka waiting for you, I doubt that we _will_ need them."

Green eyes met storm-blue for a moment. "Exactly what I was thinking," Kyouya smirked. "Benkei and Demure it is then. After all, it's… "

"Best to have a back-up plan," Nile chorused with him. "Okay, okay. But Demure, you should be fine even if you are on your own. I mean, Kyouya's training has worked wonders."

Demure flushed red. "You've been really helpful too, Nile. All your training, both of you... maybe if I can see where they're going to attack and then dodge it, maybe I could even beat one of those guys."

"Sure you can!" Benkei told him firmly, clapping him on the back and making Demure tip forwards, almost into the TV. "You'll be great now that Kyouya's been training you! Team Wild Fang is the best team in the world, because the amazing Kyouya's in charge!"

"Be quiet," Kyouya snapped, and Benkei looked hurt for a second before noticing the strange smile on the other's face. "First off, I'm not in charge. I'm just captain. It's different. For another, I'll make my own opinion of my team, Benkei. I don't need you to tell me what my underlings are doing any more, like you used to in the Face Hunters." Nile had scowled at the term "underlings". Kyouya grinned at him before turning back to Benkei. "I know you're trying to help, but stop. This is a totally different set-up to that. So leave it."

Benkei was visibly startled, but hid it quickly enough as Kyouya turned back to helping Nile finish putting Horuseus together.

"There," Nile said proudly, five minutes later. "I don't think I've ever seen a better job done."

"It's not bad," Kyouya agreed. "Madoka could have done it in half the time, but all things considered it's pretty good."

"_Pretty good?_ That's all you've got to say for yourself after three hours of work? Hey, Demure, come see what you think of this."

Demure padded over to the table and picked up Horuseus, tilting it this way and that in the light to check for imperfections and imbalances. "Looks great to me. You two are quite good blade mechanics when you put your minds to it. With your skill and power behind this, there's no way you can lose!"

Nile grinned. "And talking of that, we should get ready for bed. We've got some big matches tomorrow, and the day after."

"I suppose," Kyouya sighed, getting to his feet and pushing all of the pieces of paper he had been scrawling notes over into a pile. "We do want to be at full strength."

Nile jumped up and perched himself on the top of the bunk-bed ladder. "Kyouya, about tomorrow," he began, but Kyouya cut him off.

"No. I don't want to talk about it any more. Just leave it."

Nile shook his head. "That wasn't it. I was just going to say – tomorrow, you go out there and have fun. I know that's what you've been waiting for."

"Fun?" Benkei squawked. "Kyouya doesn't have battles for _fun,_ not against Gingka and Galaxy Pegasus!"

But Nile was still staring at Kyouya, who was staring right back. To Benkei's surprise and slight consternation, there was a deep, almost unfathomable understanding passing between them.

"I will, Nile," Kyouya promised quietly. "You do what you have to do, too."

"Of course. At least now you've got a proper opponent to challenge you, and there'll be three people right behind you who want you to win just as much as you want to. Enjoy it while it lasts, Kyouya. There's not many bladers like you and Gingka in the world."

For a moment more the room was silent, full of hope and expectation, before Kyouya shattered it with a laugh as he swung down onto his bed and leaned over to unlace his boots.

"Let's leave the seriousness for tomorrow, shall we?" he asked. "I for one am going to bed."

"They're calling you two the Kings of Africa, you know," Demure said dreamily from his top bunk, already wrapped up in his blanket. "Horus, Prince and King of the Gods, and Leone the lion, King of the Beasts."

Nile laughed as he kicked off his boots and dropped them to the floor below, where they landed squarely on top of Kyouya's own. "King Kyouya sounds a bit weird."

"So does King Nile," came Kyouya's grumpy voice from below him, and Nile laughed even harder.

"Very true. I wonder what they're calling Gingka and his team?"

"The Winged Wonders?" Demure suggested. "They've got Pegasus and Eagle."

"The Hooved Horrors," Kyouya grinned savagely. "Or the Galaxy Gobblers. I've never seen anyone eat as much as Gingka, except Benkei. No human being should be capable of eating that many hamburgers."

Nile was laughing so hard that he could only gasp, "I thought we were meant to be calming down to go to sleep, not putting each other into hysterics!"

"Shut up, King Nile," Kyouya said, rolling over to face the wall. Amazingly, Nile did exactly that, stifling his continuing laughter in his pillow as he gradually calmed.

Silence settled slowly over the room with two bunks, a comfortable silence that spoke of peace rather than hostilities. It dripped into the eyes and minds of all four occupants, setting them adrift towards sleep, knowing that when they woke it would be to the welcome company of the other three.

"Kyouya," said Nile sleepily. "Whatever happens tomorrow, I'm glad that Savannah had that mixed up selection battle. It was good to meet you."

"Yeah..." Kyouya's response was soft. "You too."

"Team Wild Fang to the end then, my friend?"

Kyouya smiled up at the bed-slats over his head that supported the young man who he had come to know, respect and – to his own great surprise, and for the first time in his life – truly trust over the past few weeks. "Team Wild Fang to the end, my friend."

The Lion had found his pride.

* * *

_And... that's it over. Well, sort of. This is where the competition entry ends, though there are a couple more chapters/epilogues which may or may not appear, depending on what people ask for. _

_I really do hope you've enjoyed this fic, (though, as Nile says, if you've read to here I must have achieved something). After all, this story represents nearly a month of solid work to get it into the state it is in, which is the longest period of time I have ever spent on a fic in one go, so that it was finished and published by the deadline. _

_To everyone who has already reviewed/favourited/alerted – thank you so much. It was an absolutely phenomenal response. Whilst I can't honestly say that it "kept me writing", because the fic was all but finished before the first chapter was posted, it was deeply encouraging to read them, and I treasure all of your comments. _

_Right, now to sort out the rest of my temporarily abandoned fics..._

_JuniperGentle  
_


	12. A Conversation Overheard

_Very short, very silly chapter, almost entirely in dialogue, in celebration of the second birthday I've had since uploading my first story under this name. (No news on the competition yet, though – sorry.)_

* * *

**A Conversation Overheard**

"Ow!"

"Hello Nile."

"Kyouya? Why're you awake?"

"Well, for one thing you just fell in through the door making a huge amount of noise, and for another, someone has to make sure this team stays safe; might as well be me."

"Ugh. Ow, that really hurts now... I don't need someone to hold my hand, Kyouya. I'm perfectly capable of looking after myself."

"As you so _capably_ proved by falling through the door and tripping over your own bag."

"Oh shut up."

"Early morning training was it?"

"Late night. Haven't gone to bed yet."

"Go on, then. Get."

"Don't you go ordering me around."

"I'm leader. You're the one who was out practising at weird hours. Get to bed."

"Huh. Ow."

"And that was _my_ bag."

"You don't need to tell me. You're the only one who's got _rocks _in his bag."

"It's for training. Extra weight. You should try it some time."

"No thanks. My bag's full enough as it is."

"Get a bigger one, then."

"Just so I can carry half the Pyramids around with me? Like I said, no thanks."

"So how _is_ training going? You and Falcon-face must nearly have your next special move sorted."

"_Falcon-face?"_

"Pfffffthahahaha!"

"Shut up, Tategami."

"That wasn't me! And why am I suddenly back to Tategami?"

"_Demure!"_

"Hahahaha!"

"B-b-b-bull!"

"Falcon-face!"

"OH SHUT UP YOU LOT!"

"Make me – ow! Right, that's it! No-one hits the King of Beasts with a pillow and gets away with it!"

"Hahahaha, have at you! Ow, Benkei, that's cheating! You can't use a mattress in a pillow-fight!"

"Why not? Team Lower Bunk are going to win, b-b-b-bull!"

"Not if Team Top Bunk have anything to say about it! Take that, haha!"

_Which was how the entirety of Team Wild Fang descended into a pillow-fight that took up the rest of the night._


	13. His Pride And Joy

_The idea for this appeared out of nowhere and sat there glaring at me until I wrote it. I considered making it a separate story, as "Stories" has been Complete for so long, but as both of them shared a number of themes and motifs, I decided that in order to understand this completely, "Stories" would have to have been read first. Hence why it is here. (If enough people think it doesn't belong here, I will move it, though.) Enjoy!_

* * *

**His Pride and Joy**

The air crackled with electricity, and tension rippled through all of the muscles in Kyouya's shoulders. Beside him, Nile's breathing was fast but level, the young man ready for whatever action was required. The dark plateau that the pair stood on seemed oddly familiar, but Kyouya couldn't think why. The air was completely, unnaturally, still.

"Demure, what can you see?" Nile's question was soft.

"Nothing except rocks," Demure reported from behind them after a moment. "Just rocks and shrubs."

Kyouya knew that the words should have made him feel more comfortable, but something was warning him of danger, and his whole body was still readying for flight – or for a fight.

He was right. They weren't alone.

"Ah." The voice was immediately recognisable, and an uncontrollable tremor slid down Kyouya's spine. Of all the people to meet in this dark, windless, desert plateau, why him? "So you did come after all."

"Don't you dare touch them," Kyouya hissed, stepping in front of Nile and putting his arms out protectively, keeping his team behind him. "If you want them, you come through _me._"

The man's strange eyes glittered as he laughed. "Oh, little lion, how little you have changed," he sneered. "Don't you remember what happened the last time you tried to do this?"

"Tough," Kyouya snapped back. "I've never let anyone beat me twice, and I'm not about to let you be the first!"

"I see there's a new bunch of hangers-on trailing behind you, though." The man's voice was thoughtful, but only insofar as he seemed to be thinking about how to annoy Kyouya the most. "You do go through them fast, don't you? Did you ever tell that broken excuse for a team why you left them? Those _Face-Hunters_ of yours?"

"Kyouya, what's he talking about?" Nile asked, one hand reaching up to clasp Kyouya's shoulder as he stepped forwards. "You have another team? Why didn't you tell us about them?"

"A long time ago," Kyouya started, but Nile had already shaken his head, removing his hand and taking a step back.

"You said you were loyal," he ground out. "If you left them, why should I believe you'll be any different with us?"

It was the swiftness of Nile's aggression and accusation that shocked and disturbed Kyouya the most. Nile had always been the level-headed one, never allowing emotion to guide his actions without very good reason. As Kyouya scrambled to think of some answer to Nile's questions, though, he realised that a heavy mist was coming down on the plateau, hiding his team-mates from him and dragging them out of reach...

.

Kyouya's eyes opened onto darkness, his breath coming harsh and fast. He hated that dream. It had only been more common since the star fragment had crashed into his blade, and it was worrying him.

Not that he'd ever admit that, even to himself.

It made no sense that it should worry him, though. The Face Hunters had disbanded relatively quietly, and he had long-since made his peace with those who were still determined to keep it going. And Doji was dead, he _had_ to be. After all, they'd all been there when the emergency services had cut through the debris of the old Dark Nebula Headquarters and brought out the battered, curled-up body of the company's mastermind. Kyouya could still see it in his mind's eye, the way that the other members of Dark Nebula – still not quite forgiven, and not quite accepted, but close enough that Gingka's weary smile could draw them still nearer – had immediately moved away from the dark suit. Yuu had shrunk back against Tsubasa's legs, turning his head away, and the instinctive response of the older, silver-haired blader had been to reach down to place one hand on the young boy's shoulder and pull him closer in comfort.

As for Wild Fang, he could never even think of leaving them for any length of time. They were his f-

Kyouya stopped that thought in its tracks. That was pathetic. He was getting even worse than Gingka. This had to stop, now.

"Nile? You awake?"

His harsh whisper was definitely audible, but there was no answer from the top bunk. Dammit. He had to get a grip on himself – this was getting ridiculous. Waking up the other person was something that toddlers did when they had a nightmare. His pride wouldn't allow him to degrade his dignity any further.

Except that was exactly it. Nile was part of his pride – the Lion's pride. There weren't very many in that group, the nomads who wandered from place to place, searching; for what, he never knew. But there was nothing that could split them apart, for they relied on each other much more than perhaps they should have. After all, it was knowing that someone else trusted him completely that allowed Kyouya to trust himself just as completely.

In this moment, disorientated from the dream and with his heart still pounding, something needed to reconnect him to the real world. There was only one person he trusted with that task.

"Nile?"

That was when he remembered. Nile was thousands of miles away in Africa, not on a bunk bed above his head.

Kyouya drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly, controlled. Leone growled deep in his mind, a comforting snarl that rumbled through every dark thought and shook them clear. The Lion was right – battles were won alone, especially battles of the mind.

"Dreams can't do anything to you, Kyouya, so stop being stupid." he snapped out loud, and then heard the shift of someone above his head.

"Hmm? Kyouya? Whassat?" The occupant of the top bunk blinked sleepily down at him, red hair even wilder than Kyouya's own. Drat. He really should think these things through first.

"Go back to sleep, Gingka. It's none of your business."

Apparently satisfied that he wasn't going to get any further, or possibly too tired to start an argument with his rival at this late hour, Gingka proceeded to roll over and drift back to sleep again.

Kyouya stretched his arms and folded them back behind his head. It was very confusing being on the bunk bed and _not_ having Nile and Demure nearby. After all, he had only been travelling with Gingka and the others for about three days now. They had stopped in a small town, about halfway between the island where they had found Ryuga and Bey City, to regroup and think over their next plan. Unfortunately, they had arrived late enough that the only remaining room for four people - Madoka had been allowed her own room, to her relief - was a double-bunk room, much to Kyouya's silent amusement.

He had automatically swung his bag onto the lower bunk, and Gingka had crowed delightedly before swarming up the ladder and perching on the top bunk with a huge grin on his face. "Thanks, Kyouya!"

Kyouya had just grunted and kicked his boots off, watching Yuki scramble up to the top of the other bunk. He still wasn't quite sure what to think of this stuff about Legendary Bladers, but if it meant he could get more and more power and have bigger and better battles with Gingka, then he would go along with it.

The first thing he had done when Yuki had finished explaining what he thought was going on was to call Nile and Demure in Africa where they were staying with Nile's family, and find out whether either of them had seen a great light in the sky. Deep down, in such a private part of his heart that he very nearly couldn't hear it, he wanted at least one of his team-mates to have claimed a star fragment too, because then who could possibly stand against them? But neither of them had, though Demure reported seeing a brilliant comet pass overhead, or maybe a meteorite. Nile had barely managed to hide his look of disappointment when Kyouya had explained his plan to hunt for more of the Legendary Bladers alongside Gingka, and had immediately offered his own assistance in Africa.

"If Demure saw a light, then it must have landed somewhere," he had pointed out. "We'll start looking straight away – we'll help you however we can."

Now, in the depths of night, Kyouya wondered how they were getting on. With the time difference, they had probably only just fallen asleep. Were they sleeping rough out in the desert, travelling? Or would they have enough money from the WBBA to be able to stay in a town? Had they even found any answers, or were they just chasing shadows across a continent?

Kyouya growled to himself, making Leone stir again. Nile and Demure were more than capable of looking after themselves; they didn't need him looking out for them all the time. If Nile was here, he would laugh at Kyouya's attempts to be their big br-

_No._ He refused to go down that route. Rolling over and tugging the blanket back up to cover his shoulders, Kyouya stared at the dark wall about a foot away from his nose. Things always got complicated when fr... alright, when _family_ was involved.

Yes, he was a lion, and yes, he ran with his pride in more ways than one, but when the nomadic prides reached the places they were to dominate, they split up. That was what had happened. Kyouya had gone on to challenge Gingka for the right to be the best, whilst Nile and Demure, the other nomads, had travelled back to find their own territory on their own terms. That was just how it was.

He didn't need anyone looking out for him, not even the WBBA. He was Kyouya, a Legendary Blader, the King of Beasts, and no-one was his equal the world over, except possibly that nuisance Ryuga, and Gingka of course. He stood tall and proud and alone, because that was how he had lived and fought and won ever since he could remember. Nile and Demure were strong team-mates and – here, in the dead of night when there was only Leone who could hear him, he could just about manage to think the word – _friends_, but he dared not let them any closer. The more that he became attached to something, the more it hurt to be separate from it. Why else would he have pursued his heart's desire of beating Pegasus across several continents and through training that would have killed a lesser man? He couldn't risk having a _person_ capable of doing that to him, because then who knew how high the cost could become?

But still, his treacherous mind whispered _Nile, my brother, I wish you were here._

.

Six thousand miles away, Nile sat bolt upright in his top bunk.

_Kyouya. _

_Brother._

_I wish you were here._

_Fin_

* * *

_I'm afraid that I've had to conclude that the competition has not gone ahead, as it has been over three months since the deadline for entries and I have heard nothing. I'm sorry about that, but at least you have all enjoyed this, as this is definitely the very last chapter of "Stories From A Bunk Bed". I may start a separate fic about Kyouya and Nile's ongoing adventures later, but I've got many other fics to get out of the way first._


End file.
